Light the Dark
by Reign of Rayne
Summary: Six years ago, Kisuke was given a choice: sacrifice one boy to a power he didn't fully understand or lose a war and damn the millions of lives that depended on him. So, really, no choice at all. The courts didn't see it the same way.
1. Chapter 1

The lamps are dying. It's a ridiculous thought, really. All they need is a little more oil and the flames will steady out. Each lamp requires only a few ounces to burn for days; the cost of that fuel hardly measures as a rounding error on the military or even research budget. A single overworked prison guard could run to a general store, procure the necessary supplies, return, and refill the lamps within a couple of hours.

And yet, the lamps continue to flicker. Kisuke watches them with deadened eyes. He has given up on actually focusing his gaze; the light is a blur of color on a black background. His throat aches. When was the last time they provided food and water? His mind cycles through memories like files in a drawer. One hour ago, two hours ago, three hours ago, a day ago, a week—

No, not a week. Too far. Mental gears, cracked with disrepair, groan to a stop and restart. Thirty and a half hours. That is how long. Thirty hours, thirty-one minutes, and twelve seconds. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen.

The sigh works its way from the deepest cells in his lungs, up his throat, and out his mouth. It moves his entire chest and shifts his shoulders against the rough stone wall. It presses his ribs against the skin pulled taught over them and makes the starved hollow of his stomach turn over in protest. And when it is gone, the only sounds left are his stubborn heart and the crackling oil lamps. For a moment, at least. Cloth slides across stone and Kisuke tilts his head. "Did I wake you?" His voice is scratchy. He needs water. The simple collector he painstakingly carved in the far corner only fills when it rains, and it has not rained in days. No amount of rationing can save him from the whims of nature.

"No." As rough as Kisuke's voice is, Ichigo's is seemingly untouched by their enforced famine. "I haven't been able to sleep in a while, anyway. It's not you."

"I see." Kisuke finally brings his eyes into focus. The tiny hole in the wall separating their two cells flickers with the light from the lamp just across the hall. "The dreams again?"

"Yeah." More movement. "Can you do another check?"

Kisuke obligingly pushes himself up and kneels by the hole. "You think it has progressed even more?"

"I didn't notice when it happened last time. I think…I think I might not be feeling it at all anymore." It's a scary thought. Kisuke peers through the hole with a single eye. Ichigo has his back to him, the bare skin there glimmering in the uneven firelight. Black marks radiate out from a single point roughly between his shoulder blades, meeting their mirrors from Ichigo's chest over his shoulders and under his arms. Around the marks—and well beyond them—Ichigo's skin is bone white. "Well?" Kisuke sighs again and draws back, giving Ichigo the bare minimum of privacy. It is all he has to offer, these days.

"You were right."

"How far?"

"It has reached your waist and your shoulders."

Ichigo curses quietly. Kisuke shuffles to his spot against his cell's back wall. The stone here is worn smoother than the rest, making it the single most comfortable part of his uncomfortable abode. "It appears to be speeding up."

"Yeah," Ichigo mutters. A peculiar sound echoes. Kisuke frowns. Porcelain? "There's something else now, too." The sound comes again. "It's developing right by the hole. Some kind of…I don't know. Armor, maybe."

"And the hole?" The black marks make it impossible to see in this lighting.

"Bigger. About the width of my palm."

A third sigh threatens to break through. Kisuke lets it die somewhere in the back of his mouth. His tongue is a leaden thing weighed down by six years of guilt.

"You don't have to apologize." Ichigo's voice cuts through the fog.

"Hm?"

"I know you've been thinking about it. I don't care about the guilt you feel, but I don't want you in my debt. So don't say you're sorry, especially because I'd do it all again, even if I knew. You gave me the chance to protect my family, my friends, my whole town. If keeping them safe means I lose my humanity, then I'll make that trade every time."

As the echoes of his voice die down, Kisuke wonders if the void in his chest will eventually grow big enough to swallow his heart. "Easy enough to say that now," he finds himself saying, "when the price is already paid. Could you say that to me with your friends behind you, begging you not to go? Could you look them in the eyes and tell them that you will never come home?"

Silence. It is all he deserves. Kisuke closes his eyes and searches for relief in the emptiness of a dreamless sleep.

* * *

Scratching. The first few times, Kisuke ignores the sound, but when it continues, he can block it out no longer. Wincing, Kisuke draws himself out of the deepest reaches of his mind and blinks his cell into focus. There is not much to see; all the lamps are almost out of fuel. The walls are hunks of black against gray bars and dark floors. Kisuke squints. His stomach is a hollow pit. He licks his lips, but it does nothing except remind him of how chapped they are. In the grand scheme of things, it is a paltry discomfort, but it grates on him all the same.

The sound of nails dragging against stone continues. It lasts for a few seconds, stops, resets, repeats. Kisuke focuses bleary eyes on the hole, but of course he can't see anything through it right now.

"Ichigo," he says, though his voice is more of a whisper than he intends. "Ichigo, are you awake?" With great effort, Kisuke pushes himself to his feet and staggers to the connecting wall. His shoulder knocks against it, and the pain chases away the most distracting tendrils of exhaustion. "I need you to answer me."

A few tense seconds. The scratching stops. "I'm here." Kisuke lets out a quiet breath of relief. "I don't have very long, though." Something in Ichigo's voice is an invitation, and Kisuke peers through the hole. Ichigo sits cross-legged facing Kisuke's cell, his back to the far wall. For all that he is just a silhouette, his left iris glows a molten gold. The sight sends chills down Kisuke's spine. Ichigo's gaze is unwavering. "You should stay out of sight. And stay quiet." He winces at something Kisuke cannot hear. The muted light of his hollow eye shines through his eyelid.

Disturbed and guilty in equal measure, Kisuke withdraws to a corner of his cell not visible from the peephole. He puts his back against the stone, crosses his legs against the protests of his aging knees, and waits. Ichigo's breathing, louder and harsher than normal, remains even for another ninety-seven seconds. It hitches at ninety-eight. Stops at ninety-nine. Restarts at one hundred and three, accompanied by sounds of quiet resistance that die soon after. He knows better than to look, even if the curiosity is a physical pull on his muscles.

A door opens. Kisuke, realization coming a second later, draws on his dwindling strength. "Stay back!" he calls to whatever poor guard has come down to check on them. The echoing footsteps stop. Ichigo's cell is quiet, but the strange gurgling sounds continue as a backdrop to Kisuke's one-sided warning. "He's having an episode. Come back when it's safe."

A trembling voice answers: "When is that, sir?"

"Two hours." Ichigo will be back to himself in less than one, but Kisuke knows he will want time to recover.

"Very well, s—"

"_RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH_!"

The guard's surprised shriek is lost in the deafening roar. Kisuke's ears ring. A door slams and the resulting breeze stirs the fading embers in each lamp. They flare, but only for a moment. One, two, three teeth-rattling booms echo from Ichigo's cell as he throws himself against the barriers keeping the walls and bars intact. Another roar, even louder and more frustrated than the first, pierces the stagnant air. Kisuke weathers the sound with exhausted equilibrium. He counts the seconds, the roars, and the booms. He counts them all, and when Ichigo's delirious strength finally fades, he starts up one last timer.

That count reaches nearly fifteen minutes before Ichigo stirs. He coughs a few times, spits, gags. "How long?"

"Thirty-seven minutes."

More coughing. "Fuck."

"You were unconscious for a quarter-hour afterwards. I told the food delivery boy to come back later."

Ichigo's mirthless chuckles barely carry to Kisuke's ears. "I bet that went over well."

"Your roared at him."

"Right."

"Do you remember?"

"Pieces." Ichigo grunts and then settles down. "When will they be back? You haven't eaten in days."

"Soon enough." Each word scrapes like sandpaper up his throat. He tries to swallow, but it offers little relief.

"When did they refill the lamps?"

Ichigo's quiet question bounces around Kisuke's skull. There is something wrong with it. Something very wrong. His mind grasps at tired observations until he finally opens his eyes. The prison is still dark. "They did not." Kisuke turns his head towards Ichigo's cell. "Can you see?"

Each heartbeat of silence is a measure of Ichigo's fear. Kisuke makes the connection and something in his chest twinges. Guilt pools behind his eyes. Another measure, then. "Let me see," he says. He crawls to the hole and looks through. He cannot see Ichigo. "Ichigo. Please."

"What can you do?" The quiet, _sullen _question catches Kisuke off-guard.

"Pardon?"

Ichigo sighs. "Sorry. I just…I don't need you to tell me this time."

"May I see?"

He gets no verbal reply, but Ichigo does move until Kisuke can see his face. This time, it is Kisuke's breathing that stutters. "Your eyes." Ichigo blinks, eyelids sliding over black sclera and gold irises. They do not glow with the promise of an episode, but they are luminescent all the same. With their light, Kisuke can see the resigned tilt to Ichigo's lips.

"There's something else," Ichigo says. He looks down, reaches with shaking hands highlighted in subtle gold to tap his chest, right around the hole. That strange porcelain sound echoes. Kisuke peers closer, but the light is too faint to see.

"What is it?"

"I still don't know. Bone, maybe. It's spreading fast. I can't peel it off."

Kisuke sits back on his heels. "This is a…new development." Ichigo's laugh makes him flinch.

"A development? A _development_? Kisuke, it's happening faster and faster. That was my third episode in—in—"

"Five days."

"In five days. I have maybe, _maybe _two or three more before I don't wake up, and you're calling this—" his voice takes on a hysterical edge, or maybe Kisuke is only now hearing it—"you're calling this a _development_. I am losing my _mind_, Kisuke. He's taking it all."

Kisuke retreats to his wall. The ensuing silence rings with accusation, with bitterness, with grief. "I am so, so sorry," he says, the words empty and meaningless. Choked, muffled sobs carries from Ichigo's cell—stifled tears for a family he cannot return to and a life he can hardly stand to live. Kisuke weathers the sounds the same way he did the roars, even though the hollow's cries never cut quite so deep.

* * *

_Six years ago_

Frowning at the monitor, Kisuke mentally runs through his experiment and tries to figure out how he could get such wildly inaccurate readings. He plugs in a few different values for the same variable and gets equally improbable results. Rocking back on his heels, he scans his small array of equipment until his gaze lands on the glass tank functioning as the reaction chamber. His eyes narrow.

Invisible from afar but obvious from up close, the tiny cracks in the glass walls are more than enough to make any trial a failure. Sighing, Kisuke flips open a nearby notepad and writes a reminder to order another tank. This experiment will have to wait until the replacement arrives, which could take weeks. Getting glass supplies on the frontlines—or anywhere near the frontlines—was a trial in and of itself. A quiet chime draws him from his musings on what his research should be in the meantime.

"Yoruichi!" She raises an eyebrow at him, and then at the mess his tent has become.

"When is the last time you cleaned this place, Kisuke?"

"I've been busy. What brings you here? I thought you were on the Western front."

She nods, picking her way around the discarded beakers, papers, and tools to the only cleared-off bench in the whole space. "I was, but we had to retreat. Most of my men are being treated in the medical tents right now. We had to take a back way and loop around to the East."

"You retreated well behind our lines, then."

"We were desperate. The enemy chased us for far longer than I anticipated. We were worrying close to civilian settlements. Fortunately, the enemy gave up before we had to do anything heroic. If they hadn't…" she shrugs. "I didn't come here to regale you with war stories, though. Ichigo! You can come in now. Careful not to trip."

Kisuke straightens in surprise as a young boy—no older than sixteen—ducks through the entrance flaps. When he checks with Yoruichi, though, she merely has a smug smile on her face.

"Ichigo, I'd like to introduce you to the head of our Research and Development team, Dr. Kisuke Urahara. Kisuke, I'd like you to meet Ichigo Kurosaki, a resident of Karakura Town."

The town name rings a bell. It is near here, only a few miles from the front lines. Yoruichi must have passed through it on her way back after her long retreat. Kisuke turns to her. "I did not realize you were in the habit of picking up strays."

She snorts. "Hardly. Ichigo?"

The kid steps forward. "I want to help."

Kisuke hardly believes this is happening. First, Yoruichi—a _captain_—grabs a random civilian out of his village while in a full retreat. Then she drags him along to their military-personnel-only frontlines base, and, as a final act, she brings him to Kisuke's lab and all the confidential projects it contains. Worst of all, he can see in her eyes that she knows exactly what she's done.

Ichigo clears his throat. "Look, I know I can make a difference. I came here because I want to protect my family and Captain Yoruichi said you'd know how to make that happen."

Kisuke fixes his longtime friend with a droll look hidden behind a chipper tone. "Did she now? Why would she say something like that to a young boy like you, I wonder?"

Unfazed, Yoruichi gestures to Ichigo. "Stop using your eyes for a second, Kisuke, and really _look _at him."

"I really don't—" Kisuke stops. For a moment, the whole world stops with him. The boy, Ichigo, is standing still, but the air around him roils with power. If not for the tens of other incredibly powerful characters wandering around the camp, Kisuke would have sensed him miles away. Now that he is paying attention, though, Ichigo's reiatsu is a beacon. And, even more interestingly, if he really looks, there are traces of…

"Well?" Yoruichi interrupts, her pleased smirk all too obvious. "Care to try your response again?"

"I think I would." Kisuke strides up to Ichigo and holds out a hand. The boy looks him in the eyes, shoulders set with all the confidence and courage a fifteen-year-old-boy can muster. "Pleasure to meet you, young Kurosaki. Call me Dr. Urahara. You and I are going to do great things together."

Ichigo shakes his hand with a firm, calloused grip. He doesn't mirror Kisuke's smile, but he doesn't have to. All plans for other research projects are unceremoniously tossed aside as Kisuke clears mental room for his new experiment, one that will be a reverse of previous failed attempts.

Great things, indeed.

* * *

_Three months ago_

"With all due respect, this committee is the one that commissioned, financed, and oversaw my research. Any crimes I may or may not have committed are not—"

"Silence!" Kisuke winces. The judge glowers at him from on high, the only illuminated figure in a sea of heads floating over empty desks. "Do you have records to prove what you say?"

"Of course."

"Where might they be?"

Kisuke's stomach sinks. His eyes flick to Yoruichi, the only silhouette he recognizes, for just an instant, and he sees in her stony expression that she too has figured out the depths of the setup Kisuke cannot escape. "They were…they were likely destroyed in the fire that destroyed my main laboratory, your honor."

The judge sits back with a huff. "How convenient for you."

"Please, your honor, give me a day to round up what evidence still remains in my lab. The fire was intentional. Someone here is trying to frame me. They want to stop my research because they know it can win the war."

"A bold claim." Whispers spread throughout the upper echelons, but they quiet down when the judge raises his hand. "Tell me this, then, Dr. Urahara, if you can. Are you not the one who conducted hollowfication experiments on our own people?"

"I was trying to cure—"

"Are you not," the judge continued, speaking louder now, his voice echoing around the chamber, "the one who took a fifteen-year-old boy from his home and performed those same despicable procedures on him?"

"Ichigo Kurosaki was a volunteer—"

"And are you not the one who, upon learning of that man's increasingly uncontrollable rages, did everything in your power to cover it up and, in so doing, put each and every one of your so-called allies at risk?"

Kisuke sees that protesting will get him nothing. His expression reflects the barest flickers of his desperate wrestle for calm amid his frustration. Arguments build themselves and fall apart in his head. He is no longer thinking of freedom when he finally speaks again. "I claim no right to an assumption of innocence. The sins on my shoulders will burden me until the day I die. Despite this, I have only ever worked in service of this country. All my research, all my experiments, all my tests were in pursuit of a final, permanent victory. Not once have I intended my exploits to cause harm to our own people.

"Ichigo Kurosaki came to me as a young man desperate for a cause. I did not seek him out. Nor did I understand the true nature of his soul. The Shattered Shaft experimental training that I put him through exacerbated an imbalance I did not know existed. By the time I realized my mistake, it was too late to correct it. I did what could to preserve his sanity so that our forces did not lose the single greatest wartime asset we have ever had before we successfully turned the tide. You would call that 'covering it up'. Maybe so. But you cannot deny that this boy you have callously thrown in prison and left to rot is the reason you are able to sit here and judge me in such comfort."

Outrage. Kisuke ignores the calls for order. "I know nothing I say will persuade you to change your sentencing. As a matter of fact, I suspect you had a punishment in mind long before I was dragged in front of this court. So be it." He stares down the judge despite being ten feet below him, eyes like steel. "In two minutes and twenty-one seconds, the remainder of my research will automatically purge itself without my hand there to stay the Kidō formulas responsible. There is nothing you can do to stop this. It was an honor serving with you."

He bows, and to any ordinary observer the gesture is genuine. Only Yoruichi catches its mocking edge—and only she sees the uncertainty buried deep between his shoulders. The guards come in a tidal wave of black uniforms and carry Kisuke away in chains. His eyes find Yoruichi's in the chaos and his expression softens. There is an apology in there, one he could never say aloud. She nods, and Kisuke closes his eyes, embracing the last taste of absolution he is ever likely to get.

* * *

"Kisuke."

He wakes with a start, blinking his cell into focus. His first thought is that they refilled the lamps. The second is that there is a plate of food in his cell. Hunger explodes in his stomach and he cannot stop himself from crawling over.

"I know you're awake."

"Apologies," Kisuke says after swallowing the mouthful of bread and water, "I was eating." The embers of their last conversation go untended. "What is it?"

"I need you to promise me something."

A dangerous preamble to any statement. "I'll need to hear what exactly it is I'm supposed to promise, first."

"Please."

Kisuke stares at the wedge of cheese on his tray. After some deliberation, he carefully splits it up into fourths. "Promises between prisoners are not worth very much, don't you think?"

"You owe me this."

It wasn't his imagination, then. The strange double-toned nature of Ichigo's voice is not a product of his hunger or exhaustion; it's really there, and growing more obvious each time Ichigo speaks. "With respect, I intend to pay all my debts in Hell like a proper sinner."

Ichigo slams a hand against the wall separating their cells hard enough to make the barriers flare orange in warning. "Kisuke!" The cheese is good, if a little soft. He chews slowly, waiting. "Please," Ichigo repeats, his voice breaking. "You're all I've got. My family—"

"Let me stop you right there," Kisuke interrupts sharply. He finally spins to face Ichigo's cell, knowing that the other man is looking through the hole. "I know what you're going to ask me to do. A final message to your friends and family for whenever I get out because you think you have no chance of survival. I cannot make a promise like that."

"Why?" Kisuke shakes his head and returns to his food. "Why? Answer me!" He bears Ichigo's cries as long as he can, but eventually the thin thread of patience holding back the terrible truth snaps.

"Because you'll kill them!" Ichigo's voice cuts off the moment Kisuke speaks and does not return. Kisuke slams the remaining half of the apple down on his tray, hands shaking. "Because you'll kill them," he repeats quietly, "long before I ever have the chance to tell them what happened to you. The next time you have an episode, you will break the barriers. You've been weakening them beyond repair each time you lose control." He hears himself as an observer in his own head, detached and methodical. "At the rate your hollowfication is progressing, it won't be three episodes or even two until your humanity is lost. It will be one. You will escape, and you will do what all newly-turned hollows do: hunt down and kill the ones closest to your heart. And there will be nothing I can do to stop you." He closes his eyes, traitorous, frustrated tears sliding down his cheeks. "That is why I cannot promise you anything, Ichigo, because I have already broken every promise I could have possibly made."

Ichigo sits heavily, the sound of his body hitting the floor echoing. "Only…one…" he whispers in numb disbelief.

"Every prediction I made was wrong," Kisuke continues, because now the words just won't stop. "Every assumption I made was wrong. You are suffering because of my arrogance. Your family will suffer because of it. I am sorry for all of it: my hubris, my ignorance, my selfishness—and the way I, and every member of this army, used you, and then discarded you when you needed us most." He draws a breath and lets it out slowly, only speaking again when he is sure his voice is level. "I will hear whatever you have left to say, but please, if I can ask anything of you, don't force me to make you a promise I cannot keep."

In the ensuing quiet, Kisuke watches his shadow twitch over the stones, at the mercy of the lamps and the fickle fires within. He wonders if it was always meant to come to this. That, no matter what choices he made that first day with Ichigo, no matter what experiments he ran in the ensuing years, they would always end up here. Maybe that's why he keeps dreaming of that moment when they first met. That was his turning point. That was when he could've said no and spared them all a world of pain—even though he knows, even now, that he wouldn't say no. That knowledge only makes his guilt worse. It is a terrible fact, but an irrefutable one: the cost of letting Ichigo live his normal life is simply too high.

If Kisuke believed in a god, he would pray. But there are no gods here. There haven't been for a long, long time. He focuses on the tray instead, on the meager food remaining.

"There's something you missed."

Kisuke finishes separating his food into another six days' worth of portions. His hands are finally steady again. "Oh?"

"If I go after anyone I'm close to, I'll go after you."

"Ah." Kisuke stares at his tray. Six days is…optimistic. He reorganizes. "I suppose you're right. I will be your first target." Four days? Three? Perhaps even fewer. He can save as much as possible and have a pathetic little feast before the hollow he'd seen as a brother tears his throat out.

Ichigo's doubled voice barely sounds like the one in Kisuke's memories. "You're pretty calm about all this."

One day. He will give himself one more day. "'Calm' is the wrong word, I'm afraid."

"Aren't you angry?"

Ichigo's sheer frustration is enough to give Kisuke pause. He takes stock. There is anger there, yes, the cooling embers of what was once a white-hot rage fueled by betrayal. Easily fanned, but there is neither wind nor fuel down here. "I was."

Ichigo growls something. He gets up and Kisuke can hear him pacing the length of his cell. One, two, three, four, turn. One, two, three, four—

"I hate this." Ichigo stops. "All of it. I did all that, I worked for all of it, I did—I did everything I could, and it ends like this. It's pathetic."

"Being consumed by a literal demon is hardly something I'd call pathetic," Kisuke demurs, but Ichigo isn't listening.

"What good is the strength to raze whole armies if I can't even use it to save my family? If it kills my family? There has to be something I can do."

Kisuke closes his eyes at the familiar phrase. Ichigo always says it when he's frustrated, and following it, he always attempts something to regain control. It never works. But their time is limited now, so he keeps those thoughts to himself. "What haven't you tried?"

"I don't know. Every time I do something, it just makes it worse. And I'm starting to think…" he trails off.

"Ichigo?"

"I'm not sure my dreams are dreams." Kisuke considers the thought. A conversation with yourself, only the other self is drained of color and almost manic. "I think he's been trying to talk to me for a long time."

"And you can never hear him."

"No."

"Why would he bother trying to communicate?" More powerful hollows were known to be more intelligent, and Ichigo's was certainty strong—most soldiers thought adjuchas level. Kisuke knew better. "You should only be an obstacle."

"I don't know what he's thinking, but whatever it is, it's not good." This time, when Ichigo stops, the pause is unnatural. Kisuke, skin prickling in response to something he cannot articulate, carefully moves towards the viewing hole.

"Ichigo?" He peers through. Ichigo is in on his knees in the center of his cell, one bleached hand over his mouth, the other over his chest. "Ichigo!"

He coughs, and Kisuke stares in mute horror as something white splatters across the ground. It is the exact color of the material creeping over Ichigo's skin. And at that the horror grows: the encroachment is happening quickly enough that Kisuke can see it with the naked eye.

Not one. Not even one full day. Is this really how it ends? His resignation feels worthless now, confronted with the reality of his fate, with the kind of fear he has not felt in decades. What kind of warrior is he if he cannot find the strength to resist an end like this?

An idea strikes, one so absurd that Kisuke would never normally entertain it.

"Ichigo," he says, urgent, "listen to me."

Ichigo groans, both hands now pressed against his temples, his whole body arched with pain.

"Ichigo!" Kisuke snaps, slamming one open palm into the wall. The barrier lights up a dull green. It is just enough to catch Ichigo's attention. His discolored eyes skate over Kisuke's, unfocused and scared. Kisuke draws on years of command to make his voice carry: "Look at me." He does. "There is one theory I never entertained: that the hollow in you is not an infection like it is in every other soldier I treated, but rather a part of your soul, something you were born with. It has never happened before, not even in rumor, but if it is the case, then the constant struggle I encouraged between you and your hollow nature has been tearing your soul apart."

Ichigo's shoulders rise and fall with his rapid breathing. The white, viscous fluid leaks from his eyes like macabre tears. It's forming something on his face. A hollow mask. Kisuke speaks faster.

"Your hollow might be fighting so desperately to take control now as a last resort to save your soul before it self-destructs." Ichigo jerks like a puppet on strings. Kisuke grits his teeth. "Look at me! Focus on me like your life depends on it! By fighting your hollow every step of the way, you have been creating a rift in the very core of your being. _That _is why you cannot hear his voice. It's why your hollow transformations are out of control when you are powerful enough to be sentient as both human and hollow. The only way to stop this hollowfication process is to bridge that gap. Work _with _the hollow instead of against it. Do you understand? You must find a way to repair the damage before you reach the point of no return."

If Ichigo hears him, if he intends to respond, Kisuke doesn't know; Ichigo stares for just a moment longer before his eyes roll up into his head and he collapses. Still breathing hard, Kisuke watches Ichigo's body, waiting for the hollow to claw its way out, but Ichigo does not stir. Kisuke can only see that he is still alive from the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes.

Drained, Kisuke falls back. His mind, alight with adrenaline just moments ago, now slogs through what he said. Born with a hollow in his soul. Soul suicide. Bridging the gap. He brings a trembling hand up to his face. Could it all really be that simple? A single impossible possibility, the answer he's been seeking for three long years? He always prided himself on considering every angle, yet he missed this one, always assuming that Ichigo's hollow was just too strong to hold back, even when Ichigo's symptoms were so different than every other infected soldier's. He'd thought it was just because he'd gotten to Ichigo quickly enough, but now…now, the truth seems obvious.

He can only hope that he intervened in time.

* * *

Kisuke pops the last of the cheese into his mouth. His tray sits empty in front of him, the corner just barely brushing the bars. Unlike Kisuke, the food tray can pass through. For a long moment, Kisuke just stares at the point where the tray and bars touch. He wants something. He doesn't know what it is. He glances at the dividing wall, trying to figure it out. Ichigo is still unconscious and has been that way for almost two hours now. There are no answers there.

"Hm." Leaning closer to the bars, Kisuke stretches out a hand and lets it rest flat against the barrier, which hardly bothers to become visible with how little force he's exerting. "Is it time, then?" No one answers—not that he expects a response—and Kisuke sighs. His escape was so important to him at the start, back when he was determined to prove his own innocence. But then he'd seen Ichigo's condition, realized the severity of what he'd done to the poor kid, and he hadn't been able to leave. He no longer knows the state of Ichigo's soul; his reiatsu is so wild that being this close has only serves to give Kisuke a headache. Actually paying attention in any capacity will surely turn that headache into a migraine.

He sighs. Finally given a choice, and he is locked in indecision. Yoruichi would be laughing at him if she knew.

It happens too quickly to process. Blinded and deafened, Kisuke pieces together the last couple of seconds through a searing agony. A blinding flash of white light—the barrier breaking. A shockwave strong enough to hurl him into the far wall—a concussive blast of Ichigo's spiritual pressure. His own head cracking against the stone before he crumpled to the floor—a concussion.

The spots in his vision recede but the darkness remains. The pressure wave blew out the lamps. Kisuke pushes himself up to his knees. Rubble surrounds him, a mixture of metal and stone. The bars have been blown off their moorings. The wall separating their cells is all but gone. And, in the center of Ichigo's cell, a lone figure stands at the very epicenter of this little explosion.

If this is going to be his end, Kisuke at least wants to see it coming. Without the barrier around to interfere, he raises a hand, a glowing red ball hovering over his palm. Its light washes over the destruction, and in response, Ichigo turns to face him. Primal fear rips up Kisuke's spine and only decades of training keep it from taking over. His Kidō ball wobbles dangerously.

The hollow that was Ichigo stares at Kisuke with brilliant gold eyes locked behind a terrifying visage. Gleaming white teeth spread across his mask in a vicious grin between two wicked horns. The fur around his neck, wrists, and ankles appears bloody in the red light. Kisuke's eyes follow the curve of the fur down to the claws on his fingers. Each one is easily an inch long and sharp enough to rend flesh. Kisuke swallows and stands straight even as the room spins around him. He has no sword and barely enough focus to maintain his light, but he'll be damned if he doesn't try.

Nothing moves. Not the hollow, not Kisuke, not even the air. And then, quite abruptly, the gold light dies. Two yawning pits of black stare out at nothing for only a moment before the mask cracks. More fissures follow with a sound like cascading stone until all of it—the mask, the armor, the claws, the fur—simply falls away, leaving a rather pale Ichigo behind.

Speechless, Kisuke watches as Ichigo blinks and brushes off the last of the strange white material. The black tendrils in his eyes retreat until there is nothing left. Color floods Ichigo's skin again, and with a final surge of reiatsu, the hole in the center of his chest closes. Even the black marks fade.

"You…you survived."

Ichigo glances up. Blinks. "Kisuke." He looks back down at himself, bringing up one hand to check that his chest is truly whole again. "I…I guess I did."

Kisuke cannot look away. It has been years—_years_—since he saw Ichigo like this: healthy, whole, _human_. It is a jarring reminder of how much he'd lost. "You were unconscious for nearly two hours. What happened? How did you reverse the hollowfication process?"

"I did what you told me to do," Ichigo says with a shrug. "I was right about the dreams. They weren't dreams. I went to the same place they always took place in and worked things out with my hollow."

"Worked things out," Kisuke repeats.

"Yeah. It was pretty difficult, and he says we were pretty much dead when everything snapped back to the way it's supposed to be."

"You can hear him now?"

Ichigo nods. "He's kind of annoying." He winces. "And loud."

Relief floods through Kisuke and steals what little strength remains in his muscles. He falls to his knees, sharp rocks cutting into his legs. The light goes out.

"Kisuke? Kisuke!" Ichigo catches him by the shoulders. His irises shift from brown to gold, but his voice remains unmistakably human. "Hey, you okay?"

"I'll be fine," Kisuke says through a bubble of hysteria threatening to burst, "in just a moment." Ichigo still helps him sit against an intact wall before looking around.

"What happened here?"

The laugh breaks through, but Kisuke quickly gets it under control. "You did, I'm afraid."

"Oh. The barrier?"

"Down. Shattered, in fact."

"Huh." Kisuke can hear Ichigo moving in the dark. A minute later, one of the lamps flares to life. When Ichigo faces him again, his eyes have returned to normal. The part of Kisuke's mind that has been keeping notes this whole time goes mad with curiosity. Kisuke cordons it off to dream up experiments on its own. "Feeling better?"

"Enough." Waving off Ichigo's assistance, Kisuke gets to his feet. He sways, braces himself against the wall, and closes his eyes against a cresting wave of nausea. It passes, and he straightens. "And you? You're sounding rather healthy."

Ichigo chuckles and awkwardly scratches the back of his neck. "To be honest, I still haven't really processed everything. I'm just enjoying not feeling like I'm being torn in two." He looks over the destroyed cells again. "But…what now?"

What now, indeed. "Ichigo." He looks so much younger. Kisuke, despite being only a couple decades his senior, suddenly feels very old. "I'm sorry."

Ichigo frowns. "This again? I told you—" he stops when Kisuke holds up a hand.

"A different apology, this time. Every treatment I tried on you made one critical assumption I never thought to question until I was left with no other choice: that your hollowfication was the result of you encountering and being infected by a hollow. I was wrong, and I was too proud to see it, and if I hadn't been so caught up in my own beliefs, we may have avoided all of this." Kisuke lets it end there, knowing that anything else will just be an excuse. Ichigo stares at him for one second. Two. Three. Fo—

"I get it." Ichigo absently nudges a couple rocks away from his feet. "You've been apologizing nonstop since you joined me down here. I know you're sorry." His eyes harden. "But I also know neither of us would change anything that already happened. I'd still say yes to your experiments, and you'd still run them. Maybe we could avoid all this if we got a second go at it, but that's not possible. I'll admit, I got pretty angry at you. I thought I'd lost everything, but getting my balance back…it's helping me see things for what they are. I'm still mad—hard not to be—but you were doing everything you could to help me when you realized you fucked up, and that should count for something. We both know what would've happened if you hadn't let me fight in this war. So stop apologizing. I already forgave you. Now," Ichigo jerked his chin at the exit door, "what do you think about seeing the sun again?"

Kisuke closes his eyes, takes a breath, nods, and straightens his shoulders. "I think I'd like that. Although…" Ichigo stops, one eyebrow climbing high. "I believe there is someone in our army working against us."

"A double agent?"

"Most likely. They burned down my lab and staged the trial that put me here. I think they intended for you to kill me, since my crimes weren't enough for outright execution. If we just leave without a plan in mind, we'll be making targets of ourselves all over again."

Ichigo's eyes flick between Kisuke's face and the door. "Any idea who it is?"

"A few."

"And if they're influential enough to get you thrown in prison, they'll probably stir the whole camp into a riot if we try to find them. Especially since I just broke us both out."

Watching Ichigo's expression carefully, Kisuke nods. "Almost certainly."

"I know you've already got plans brewing in that head of yours."

"A few." Ichigo snorts. "I won't force you into anything. I want it to be your choice. I was convicted in court; they'll never let me back into the fold. I'm sure that you, however, could find a way to demonstrate that you have control again. They'd leap at the chance to have you back. Plenty of your men were upset about your imprisonment, never mind your fellow captains."

Ichigo bites his bottom lip, his gaze going distant, his focus turning inward, before he nods. "Fine. But only if I stay in your corner."

"My corner?"

"I'm not gonna just abandon you to whatever this asshole has planned. You're scarily smart, but if it comes down to a fight, I want to be there. You gave me the strength to protect everyone I care about. That's a debt I'll never call even. I know you like to solve your problems on your own, but that's what got us here to begin with. If—when—you find this guy, you let me know, and we'll tear him apart together."

"You're remarkably willing to work with a rogue for someone with a reputation as such a dependable soldier."

Ichigo grins, and it holds a sharp, hungry edge that Kisuke has never seen before. "Things change. You catch the spy, we give him what he's due, and then we win the war."

"It sounds so simple when you phrase it like that."

"With what my hollow is telling me we can do? Yeah, it just might be."

* * *

_**Just might be worth a review, too.**_


	2. Chapter 2

It is a stupid thing to get so worked up about, Aika knows that, but she can't stop herself. What else is she supposed to do? Watch as the thief makes off with whole armfuls of precious inventory?

"Get back here!" she hollers, skidding around the latest corner fast enough to kick up dust. The scrawny kid—Bastion, she's sure, though with that ridiculous tarp over his head it's hard to tell—yelps and redoubles his efforts to get away. Grinding her teeth in frustration, Aika lengthens her stride even as her lungs burn for air. She _needs _those supplies. She needs the money they're worth. And while she knows that Bastion needs them too, there just isn't enough to go around in a town like theirs.

She misjudges a step and knocks her shoulder into some stranger's. It's like hitting a wall and she almost loses her balance. Getting her feet back under her, she tosses an apology over her shoulder and resumes the chase.

That tiny pause is enough to put Bastion solidly in the lead. He's heading for the abandoned half of town, and once he reaches there, Aika will never be able to track him. That's his territory, just like the shop and its surrounding streets is Aika's.

Her lungs are on fire. She won't catch up to him in time.

In the end, she doesn't have to. Bastion, in the middle of glancing back to see how close Aika has gotten, slams headlong into a man Aika could have sworn wasn't there a second ago. Bastion falls back on his butt, bags of food rolling in the dirt while he clutches his nose.

Aika stops, panting. The stranger bends down and retrieves the bags, holding them out to Aika. "These are yours, aren't they?"

His voice is smooth with a strange edge to it. Before Aika can take the bags, Bastion clambers to his feet and swats at them.

"Those are mine, fair and square! Give them back!"

The stranger just lifts them out of Bastion's reach and continues addressing Aika, paying no heed to the child jumping and clawing at his cloak. "You seemed like you were in a pretty big hurry when you hit me earlier. I hope I'm not overstepping."

Aika blinks. She hit _this _guy? While the shadow of his hood hides his face, she can see his hands and upraised right arm. His hands are calloused, his arms lean but taut with muscle. Is he a soldier? Yusuki was killed by one of them for—for just saying the wrong thing, if the rumors were true. "That was you? I'm—I'm so sorry, I didn't mean—"

"It's fine, I wasn't hurt." Aika gets the feeling he's smiling a little under that veil of darkness. "So, these belong to you?"

"Yes." Bastion, having given up, watches with sullen eyes as Aika takes back her shop's things. Aika gives him a hard look. "The next time I catch you stealing from me, I won't be so nice."

He sticks out his tongue and disappears into the labyrinth of burned-out homes. Aika sighs and hikes the bags up higher so they're a little easier to carry. "He'd be a good kid in a better town."

Without a word, the stranger steps forward and takes the two heaviest bags. "Tough times?"

"We've had three hollow attacks in the last two weeks. People are leaving this place in droves. The ones that stay are desperate or stupid."

The stranger, head-and-shoulders above Aika, glances down at her as they walk back to her shop. "Which are you?"

"Both. My family has lived here for generations, and I'm too dumb and too stubborn to try to move elsewhere. I can't take my father's shop with me, and I won't leave my family's only legacy behind." She stops talking, cheeks flooding with heat. She hadn't meant to say so much, but something about this man—the set of his shoulders, the tone of his voice, maybe just his aura—invites familiarity, invites trust. "Anyway, I, um, I never introduced myself." She can't exactly stick out a hand, but she does her best to make eye contact. "I'm Aika."

The stranger considers her for a long moment before inclining his head. "Ichigo."

"Well, thanks for saving my stuff, Ichigo."

"Not a problem."

When they reach the shop, Aika directs Ichigo, and together, they get everything put away within a couple of minutes. When they finish, Aika stands awkwardly behind the counter, not knowing the proper way to say her thanks. Ichigo saves her the trouble.

"I'll be heading out, looks like you've got things handled from here. Nice meeting you, Aika."

"Nice meeting you too. Stay safe out there."

He raises a hand in farewell and leaves. Aika returns to taking inventory, unable to get the strange man with the strange voice out of her head.

* * *

Hours later, she's selling her last bag of rice when the roar splits the air. Her hair stands on end and her muscles lock. The woman across the counter goes still as stone, her skin tinting gray with fear. They all know what that sound means.

"There's a trapdoor in that corner," Aika says, pointing with a shaking hand. They both scramble for it as screams carry in from outside. The open door, left that way to welcome customers, now beckons the demon. Aika hauls open the trapdoor and gestures for the old woman to go first. She refuses. "Either you go first or we both get eaten," Aika snaps, nerves too frayed to hold patience. The old woman begins her descent.

The street is silent.

A shadow falls across the ground just outside the door.

The old woman is only a few rungs down. There is no room for Aika. Fear rolls off her in waves. Her heart is the only thing moving in her whole body and she prays to whatever gods are out there that the hollow will keep walking, that it will leave her small shop alone.

But, of course, the gods are dead. The hollow's face swings around and soulless yellow eyes fix on Aika. The hollow's hunger pins her in place; slack fingers loose their grip on aging wood. The trapdoor swings shut with a bang, the old woman crying out in worry before her voice is muffled to silence. Aika can't move. She can barely breathe.

Maybe it won't notice her. She's in the back corner, in the shadows, and aside from the extremely loud sound of the trapdoor closing—

The second roar makes her ears ring. Her vision goes gray at the edges, the black hole of the hollow's mouth sucking at her vision, and she is so, _so_ scared.

Aika watches, numb, a witness to her own end, as the hollow shoulders through the doorway. Wood splinters and the shoddy shelves collapse under the hollow's gleaming claws.

She should run.

She should really run.

But she can't even blink.

The hollow's spiked shoulders screech across the ceiling. The shoddy lights Aika replaced only a few days ago crack and shatter. Paint chips rain down, and as the hollow's jaws yawn wide, all Aika can think about is the corn spilling across the floor, torn out of broken bags.

It's such a waste.

She closes her eyes and braces for pain unlike anything she's ever known before—pain that never comes. She opens her eyes to see a clawed hand punched through the hollow's mask. The hand retracts, and a moment later, the hollow collapses and begins breaking apart.

The suffocating pressure holding Aika in place releases its grip and Aika goes limp, collapsing on weak legs against the wall. Her breath rasps against her throat. She feels dizzy. Is it normal to feel dizzy?

"Hey." The soft voice startles her out of her thoughts. "Whoa, it's okay, it's just me." Her eyes land on a shock of orange hair and, below that, a concerned face. Amber eyes meet hers and hold steady. The man holds out a hand. He's crouching in front of her, and while Aika doesn't recognize his features, she does recognize his voice. "Can you stand?"

Her gaze falls to his hand. Blood coats the skin, clinging stubbornly even as the rest of the hollow disappears. But Ichigo's hand is as human as Aika's—no sign of the pure-white skin or vicious claws that had torn through the hollow's head from behind.

"I can stand," she manages. Ichigo hauls her to her feet, and though the room spins for a moment, she forces it back to rights. "There's a woman in the basement."

Ichigo kneels and hauls open the door without any apparent effort. "Hello? It's safe to come out now."

Aika hears shuffling steps and then the woman's face gets illuminated by the sunlight bouncing around the wrecked shop. Her shoulders sag in relief when she sees Aika. "Oh, love, thank the gods you're all right."

Once Aika and Ichigo have helped the woman get back up, and once the woman has hurried home to see to her family, Aika takes stock of the damage. Her stomach sinks. She can't afford to fix all this.

"That's four."

Next to her, Ichigo is staring out at the street with strange intensity. "Sorry?"

"Four hollow attacks. Four attacks in three weeks. You're not _that _close to the frontlines. Hollows shouldn't be breaking through that consistently, and definitely not ones as powerful as this one." He nudges the decaying carcass with an uncaring foot. "Something else is going on here…just like he told me."

Ichigo mutters the last part as a comment clearly meant for his ears alone. Aika swallows. "I don't mean to be rude, sir, but who exactly are you? It's not just anyone that can take down a hollow like you did. Are you a soldier?"

Though he doesn't _dress _like a soldier. Last Aika checked, ratty old cloaks aren't part of the standard uniform.

"Ah, something like that," Ichigo says. He looks oddly bashful. "Anyway, what was up with the other part of town?"

"The—there were too many attacks, and then a fire. We just haven't been able to rebuild." There aren't even enough people left to populate it if they do manage reconstruction. "Why?"

"I need to go there."

Aika trails after him on reflex. "Go there? For what possible reason? There's nothing there but ghosts."

Ichigo pauses in the street, which is disturbingly empty. It will be a while before anyone risks leaving their homes. He glances around at the hollow's trail of destruction, a muscle in his jaw flexing before he focuses on Aika. "You should stay inside for a while, just like everyone else."

He clearly intends it to be a dismissal. Aika keeps pace with him anyway. "Why? What are you planning to do?"

When he realizes Aika isn't going to leave, Ichigo sighs but keeps walking. "A…friend of mine got wind that there might be some kind of…secret enemy base around here somewhere. I'm investigating."

That rings false. "Hollows aren't smart enough to build bases."

"And they're not smart enough to wage a war for nine years either, but here we are."

Aika bites her lip, only to nearly trip over Ichigo's foot when he suddenly stops.

"That's the kid from earlier, right?" He points to Bastion, who has one hand in Ms. Laakti's pocket.

"Yes, why—"

Ichigo _disappears_. Before Aika can even process the sudden void next to her, he reappears behind Bastion and yanks him into the air by the collar of his shirt. Bastion yelps. Shocked out of her stupor, Aika runs over.

"What are you doing?" she demands as Bastion starts flailing. "Ms. Laakti, I'm so sorry, he didn't mean it—"

"Let go a' me! Let go!"

"_Bastion_!"

He goes quiet when Aika snaps at him. She never snaps at him, even when he steals, but she's a bit frazzled. Gathering herself, Aika turns again to Ms. Laakti. "You should really go back inside ma'am, it's not safe."

Ms. Laakti blinks, clearly confused by the sudden commotion. "I was just checking that the fruit stand was locked up."

"You should listen to her," Ichigo puts in while effortlessly avoiding all of Bastion's attempts to hit him. "It's dangerous out here right now."

"R-right." Ms. Laakti retreats indoors, wallet intact. Ichigo brings Bastion up to eye level and glares at him.

"Seriously, kid? Robbing an old woman like that? And during a hollow attack, too? What were you thinking?"

Bastion scowls with all the venom he can muster. "Shut up! You're out here too, you jerk!"

One of Ichigo's eyebrows ticks. "I'm supposed to be here, brat. Killing hollows is my job."

"Well you're not very good at it!"

"Watch it," warns Ichigo, an eerie, echoing tone layered on top of his normal voice. It makes the hairs on Aika's arms stand on end, and even Bastion goes still, eyes wide. Ichigo pinches his nose with a free hand and lets out a breath. "Look," he continues, his voice back to normal, "I need your help with something. You help me out, the hollows stop attacking your town. How's that sound?"

Bastion glances at Aika, but she can only shrug. "Whaddayou mean?"

Ichigo sets the young boy back on the ground, and for once, Bastion makes no immediate move to run. "I was sent here on a special mission to take down an enemy base. I know it's somewhere around here, and I think it's in the abandoned half of town—your territory, right?" Bastion nods slowly, shooting another look Aika's way. She realizes rather suddenly that Bastion is out of his depth and knows it. She tries to look confident in Ichigo for his sake. "Is there anything strange out there? Doors that don't open, footprints that don't belong, anything that looks out of place?"

"Um."

"Bastion." Aika crouches to his level. She's known Bastion all his life, and while they have never seen eye to eye, now is the time to build bridges, however temporary they may be. "You know that place like the back of your hand. I've never been able to catch you once you get in there. You know all the best places to hide. Think about it. Has anyone taken a spot that should be yours?"

He licks his lips, eyes flicking between Aika and Ichigo in the most obvious sign of his nervousness. "There might be a spot."

Ichigo smiles grimly. "Show me."

* * *

Bastion leads them through a winding maze of dusty streets. Aika focuses on staying oriented and ignoring the abandoned buildings. The shadows play tricks on her vision, hinting at people watching when Aika knows there is no one there. Ichigo leads the way, Bastion at his side. Bastion is constantly looking back at her, childish features pinched with worry he can't hide. Aika tries to be reassuring each time they make eye contact, but she really doesn't want to be here. This place has always creeped her out.

"What now?" Ichigo asks, stopping at a six-way junction. Bastion points left.

"It's the third house on the left. There's something weird about the floor, and…"

"And?"

"I think I've seen stuff moving in there." Bastion's voice dips into a mumble. "Bad people."

Ichigo gives Bastion a considering look and then stops walking. "You two wait here." He gestures to the first empty house on the right. "There's enough cover there that no one'll see you if you stay low. I don't know how many hollows could be in this place. There's no guarantee I can keep them all contained."

Aika takes a few steps towards the empty doorway before she realizes Bastion isn't following. "Bastion?"

"You won't find it without me."

Ichigo frowns. "What?"

"It's hard to spot." Bastion puffs up his chest. "You're gonna need me to show you."

"I'll go too," Aika says. Seeing Ichigo's hesitation, she keeps going. "We can run if there's trouble. Bastion knows the safe spots around here."

"If you're sure."

Aika reaches out and squeezes Bastion's shoulder. He straightens, then strides forward. Aika falls behind, giving the boys a few yards' lead. The closer they get to the house, the slower Ichigo moves, until they are all moving at a crawl.

"Wait here," he murmurs when they are in the middle of the street. He disappears again. Aika, a little more used to it than Bastion, manages to hide her surprise. Bastion does not, but his whispered exclamation does not carry far. Ichigo returns a moment later. "Sensors," he explains without preamble. "We're good now."

"So there is a base here?"

"Yeah. If you see anything, say something right away."

Aika nods. They duck through a section of collapsed wall, picking their way around scattered bricks and mortar.

"Pressure plates." Ichigo's voice makes Aika freeze. "Step where I step. Bastion, how'd you get in here before?"

"Window."

Aika glances at the far wall where the window lets in musty beams of sunlight. It's far too small for Aika and Ichigo to fit through.

After a tense minute, they are all inside, and—as far as Aika can tell—they have avoided setting off any alarms. Ichigo cedes the floor to Bastion, who takes a couple hesitant steps before he spots what he's looking for. He points to the far-left corner.

"It's a couple feet off the wall, see it?"

Ichigo gets closer, crouches, and peers at the floor. "There're seams. A trapdoor?"

Bastion shrugs. "Thought it might be a storage basement, but I couldn't get it open 'cause there's nothing to grab."

Ichigo gives the door a considering look. He reaches out and knocks against it a few times, head tipped towards the sound. He nods. "Okay, I think I've got it. You two, get back, and get ready to run if you spot trouble." He's already counting on a fight? "I can't guarantee your safety, but I'll do everything I can to keep the fighting down there."

"Good luck," Aika says in the lull. "Stay safe."

Bastion says nothing, but he sticks by Aika's side. Ichigo nods and holds up a hand. The edge of his cloak falls back, revealing his arm almost up to the shoulder. For a second, Aika doesn't understand what he's doing; his arm is just an arm. Where's his weapon? Every other soldier Aika has seen or heard about carried a sword.

His skin loses all color. It happens in splotches, spreading from his elbow down to his fingertips. White blooms over every inch as his nails lengthen into vicious claws. Strands of red hair thicken into a fur bracelet over his wrist. Aika can't tear her eyes away.

Ichigo flexes his fingers, sets himself up by the trapdoor, and, in one swift, brutal motion, punches through up to his shoulder. He leans over, hand still on the underside, and feels around for a few seconds before he smirks in satisfaction. The trapdoor pops open and Ichigo recovers his arm.

It's the same hand that punched through the hollow's head.

"What are you?" Aika whispers. Ichigo yanks the door all the way open and glances up at her.

"An ally."

He jumps down, but not before Aika catches a glimpse of white spreading all across his neck and face. She wraps an arm around Bastion's shoulders on reflex. He doesn't protest and even holds her arm in return.

Should they try to leave? But Aika doesn't remember the layout of the pressure plates and only Bastion can fit through the window. Those traps could be alarm triggers or—and her breathing catches at the thought—explosives. She can't take that risk without knowing there's something much worse coming out of that trapdoor.

After a minute, Bastion breaks out of her grip. He doesn't wander far, his gaze riveted on where Ichigo dropped down.

A hollow's roar, muted by distance and layers of underground infrastructure, abruptly cuts off. Aika shivers. Distant booms shake loose dust and dirt from the building's ceiling. She's in the middle of brushing off some residue from her shoulders when Bastion speaks.

"He wasn't normal, was he?"

Aika pauses, then very deliberately keeps at it. "He's a soldier."

"I've met soldiers before." Bastion almost sounds accusing, like he knows Aika is lying. "None of them could change their skin."

It's more than changing skin. The first time, Aika had been too caught up in the hollow trying to eat her that she hadn't noticed, but here, it was obvious: when Ichigo's arm transformed, the air grew heavy and dark—exactly like it did when any hollow was near.

"He saved my life."

"That doesn't mean anything," argues Bastion. "What if he's—" his voice drops—"a hollow?"

"Don't be ridiculous." Aika shivers. "He's as human as you and me. You saw. He's not a hollow."

As she finishes, a new roar pierces the air, this one louder and more feral than all the ones before it. The sound cuts through Aika's skin and makes her heart freeze in her chest.

Bastion's face is white with fear and Aika knows hers is much the same. She has never heard a roar like that. All the hollows she's heard have been almost…almost sad, kind of haunting, and maybe angry. But that one? That was a challenge, ripe with bloodlust.

It is, at its core, the signal for Aika and Bastion to leave. "Do you remember the arrangement of the pressure plates?"

Bastion nods and leads with fear-wracked limbs. Hollows' cries grow in number and volume only to disappear just as fast. When they make it to the street, the sudden surge of silence is deafening. Aika wordlessly grabs Bastion's hand and leads them at a fast walk down the street, Bastion half-jogging to keep up with Aika's long strides. Was it a left at the corner? Or was it a right?

The ground explodes. Aika shrieks and falls back, whole spine buckling for a moment as red drowns out everything she can see. Still feeling Bastion's hand in hers, she curls around him, aching back taking the brunt of the heat as the red energy dies down.

Before the ruined street can settle, a new cry echoes among empty buildings. Air rushes past Aika. She shifts and manages to get a glimpse of a dark shape—_hollow_—flying upwards with strange desperation.

A second shape shoots up after it, this one smaller, humanoid, and white. The two hollows collide in the air. Aika covers Bastion's eyes but can't look away herself as the white hollow rips a wing off the other. They both tumble to the ground. Squinting through the dust, Aika makes out the white hollow stabbing an arm down in a familiar gesture, and when the dust clears, there is only the white hollow and a fading lump of reishi.

Her heart thuds against her ribs. Bastion pulls her hand off his face. Aika doesn't look back to see his expression, but his grip on her wrist gets painfully tight.

"Bastion," Aika whispers, "when I give the signal, you run, okay? You run and you don't stop."

He doesn't say anything, but he gets to his feet when Aika does, and she loses the feeling of his fingers on her skin a moment later. Aika puts herself between the hollow and Bastion, unfamiliar bravery steeling her limbs when all she wants to do is turn tail and run until her lungs give out. If she can give Bastion a chance, then she has to try.

The hollow finally looks away from its dead prey. Aika nearly loses her nerve when burning gold eyes meet hers. Black lines slice through a mask framed by two wicked horns.

"Bastion."

He runs. Aika doesn't look away from the hollow. It cocks its head as Bastion flees but makes no move to follow. Is it letting him go? Aika _is _the bigger body. More food?

She swallows. She can't hear Bastion's footsteps anymore. She hopes he finds a spot where the hollow will never look.

And then, unbelievably, the hollow speaks, and its voice—for all that it is grossly inhuman—sounds like Ichigo's.

"Are you scared?"

For a long, hysterical second, Aika thinks she misheard, but the words don't change when she turns them over in her mind. Her mouth opens without her brain present enough to stop it. "Scared? I'm terrified."

"You told him to run."

Is it Ichigo? The fur on its wrists is the same. It has more on its neck and ankles. Its hair is the same shade of orange, but it's far longer, stretching nearly to its waist. And Aika is willing to bet that Ichigo never had such a horrible hole in his chest.

"I did." The longer she talks, the more time Bastion has.

The hollow releases a rattling sound. A sigh, Aika realizes. "I should've warned you. Sorry about that."

A crack splits the mask. It's followed by a cascade of others. They spider across the hollow's entire body in a wave of broken lines. The white material Aika had thought was skin falls off in pieces that quickly become a rain, but all of it breaks into nothing as soon as it hits the ground. The horns, the mask, the hair, the fur—it all disappears, and when it goes, it leaves behind a very familiar man.

Ichigo unties and shrugs up the cloth wrapped around his waist. His cloak. With the familiar fabric settled on his shoulders, he looks nothing like the hollow that stood in his place seconds ago.

Aika has no words. Her mind is a single line of incomprehension. She can only watch as Ichigo brushes the last bits of white out of his hair. He walks over to her, face pinched with worry.

"You okay?" His voice doesn't have any of that strange double-toned sound it had before. He leans a little closer. "Aika?"

The sound of her name in his mouth pulls her back into her own body. She meets his gaze. "What are you?"

This time, the question is neither accusing nor afraid. It is numb, shocked beyond feeling. Ichigo's expression softens and he gives her space.

"I wasn't lying before. I am an ally, and I am a soldier, just...a special one." He rubs the back of his neck, glancing around with wary eyes. "How much do you know about the war effort?"

Not much. It must show in her face, because Ichigo nods.

"Well, I'm one of the captains. Kind of," he amends after a beat. "I'm a bit of a weird situation these days. How do I put this?" He chews his lip for a second, then settles on something Aika can only guess at. "Okay, I'm only going to say this once. I was born with a hollow in my soul. The army taught me how to use it to fight. After some rough times, I figured out how to do that the right way. A friend of mine sent me this way because he heard about some suspicious stuff happening in your town—that wasn't a lie either. Technically, I'm not supposed to be here, or even really exist at all, so if you could keep this quiet…" he trails off hopefully. To his right, a building clipped by the energy beam earlier finally gives way with a groan, crashing through the massive hole in the ground. Ichigo's expression turns sheepish. "As quiet as you can, anyway."

His focus skates over Aika's right shoulder and she turns to see Bastion peering around the corner. Her shoulders drop. "I told him to run."

"Looks like he didn't listen."

Bastion approaches slowly, warily, his eyes constantly switching between Aika and Ichigo like either of them will hint at what's going on. Aika certainly can't explain, and while Ichigo's crisp detailing most definitely passed through her ears, she hasn't parsed a word of it. The disintegrating hollow, its head disappearing before its tail, tips and slides into the hole with a resounding thud.

"Um," Bastion starts.

"Hey." Ichigo crouches down. "You all right?"

Bastion points a shaking hand at the crater. "That was you, wasn't it?"

Ichigo dips his head, takes a breath, and then musters a strained smile. "Yeah. Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you."

Suspicion paints itself across Bastion's face. He still hasn't stepped past Aika; he's using her as a shield.

After a beat of awkward silence, Ichigo straightens, his tone turning businesslike. "Okay, I'm pretty sure I took care of all the hollows in there, but I have to do another sweep to make sure. You two should head on home—and whatever you do, don't go down there." One of his hands presses against a spot near his stomach. "There are some nasty traps in there. Deadly, understand?"

Aika nods and catches Bastion doing the same.

"Good."

Abruptly, Ichigo switches his gaze to the sky. His eyes go wide, he curses, and then a blur shoots down from on high and tackles him to the ground. Aika only catches pieces of a conversation held between two figures doing their absolute best to pin each other down:

"—go—run—middle of—night!"

"Had—Kisuke—can't say no!"

The woman—because she is a woman—finally separates from Ichigo, kneeling across from him with eyes narrowed in suspicion. Her purple hair sways in the weak breeze. "Kisuke sent you here?"

Ichigo coughs for a second, massaging his throat, before he shoots her a spiteful glare. "You think I'd ditch camp in the middle of the night for anything else?"

The woman only raises an eyebrow. Ichigo rolls his eyes. "Gods, Yoruichi, I'm _fine_. I'm not gonna have another episode, and I'd warn you if I was. I wouldn't just _leave_. I don't do that."

Yoruichi finally seems to process that Aika and Bastion are still standing there and staring. She peers at them. "Who are your friends?"

"Just some locals that helped me out."

"And you told them, didn't you?" Ichigo's silence is damning. Yoruichi sighs. "You're too trusting, Ichigo."

"I didn't really have a choice."

"Please. There's always a choice." Yoruichi rises to her feet, lithe like a cat, and crosses her arms. She takes in the state of the street with clinical eyes. "Kisuke was right, then?"

"Yeah. Nasty stuff down there. You'll want to clear it out, keep it cordoned off for a while."

Yoruichi grunts. "Rest of the search team will be here in a few minutes. Better get your story straight before then. And you two," she looks at Aika and Bastion, "you should really get out of here."

Utterly lost, Aika looks to Ichigo. He nods. "Thanks for the help."

They somehow end up back at Aika's family shop. Bastion wanders around the broken shelves, nudging at spilled food and broken tools with his dust-covered feet. Aika rests her hands on the front counter, stares at the shattered doorway, and decides she's had enough of soldiers and hollows and war.

She has her shop, and that's all she wants to care about.


End file.
